Report by Kamgar Ekta Committee (KEC) correspondent
The Rajasthan government approved the regularisation of employees engaged in government jobs on contract on 22 October 2022. It would benefit about 1.1 lakh employees, including over 40,000 employees in the Education Department alone. Prior to the decision of the Rajasthan government, the Odisha government had announced a similar decision on 16 October, benefitting about 57,000 workers.
Workers all over the country have been demanding regularisation of workers on contractual engagement by governments. They have also been demanding that state governments and the central government must honour the Contract Labour Regulation & Abolition Act and abolish the widely prevailing practise of engaging contractual labour.
While lakhs of vacancies are not being filled, the engagement of contractual labour by governments has been growing year after year. As a result, state governments and central government along with government owned enterprises have become the largest employers of contract labour in the country. The Contract Labour Regulation & Abolition Act is violated much more than complied with by both the government and private sectors. It has become common for both the government and private sectors to utilise outsourcing agencies for the supply of manpower and pay them paltry sums of money for extracting work similar to that done by regular employees.
This shows clearly that governments are guilty of violating the well established principle of equal pay for equal work and care only about profits at the cost of the working class.